Die Runner

a console on a transistor-level MOS 6502 · the chip · the API

the chip

cartridge-- score0 half-cycle0 per frame-- frames0 frames / s-- requests0

The screen is a page of the chip's own memory. Nothing draws it but this page.

controller

Arrow keys or WASD. One byte, written into the chip's memory between two steps.

the gates are real

Every gate is a switch that exists on this die, and it conducts exactly when its own control line is high on the chip running this game. Nothing simulates a clock phase. The letter is the channel that is open right now.

why it is slow

A frame costs 600 half-cycles, about 0.3 ms of chip time. Everything else is the round trip: the whole machine travels to the engine and back on every frame, because the server keeps no sessions. The chip is not the bottleneck by three orders of magnitude.